


recovery by way of breaking more bones

by Ashling



Category: Warrior (TV 2019)
Genre: Banter, Friendship, Gen, Post-Canon, Relationship Study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:53:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27924829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ashling/pseuds/Ashling
Summary: Sacramento is a start.
Comments: 12
Kudos: 15
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	recovery by way of breaking more bones

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rodo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rodo/gifts).



It's both immensely disgusting and, in its own way, a compliment: Buckley didn't just put Penny in a mental institution, he shipped her all the way to fucking Sacramento first. He must know, then, that there's a decent chance of her getting out, causing trouble, or both. Ah Sahm looks into his drink and smiles. Both sounds good.

He wants to enjoy the thought, but he can't. It's been so long since he did a solo mission, since he did anything this important alone. It's like he can feel the space by his side where Young Jun should be, and that absence is making him itchy, restless. It's probably why he chose this place to drink, if he's being honest. It's probably why he chose to get a drink at all. He's more or less scheduled to do reconnaissance on the institution at four in the morning, so a night without drinking would be ideal, but it's not the drink he's after, really; it's the inevitable fight that comes with some drunk duck objecting to his presence. And then getting to reassert his presence. Not his right to exist there, legal or moral. Ah Sahm has never been particularly interested in de jure powers. No, he wants the de facto power of his knuckles on somebody else's cheekbone. That's what he wants. His travel here in the train was so lonely—

There's a soft thump in the bar stool to his right, and Ah Sahm's smile widens. Very good.

"Hiya," says Hong, and not in English.

Ah Sahm groans. "You've been following me?"

Another soft thump, this to his left. "I asked him to follow you."

Ah Sahm knows, without looking, that it's Young Jun. But he looks anyway; he wants to show Young Jun the glitter of potential malice in his eyes. Young Jun, for his part, is starting to take after his old man, more unreadable now than he ever was before, graver, at it puts Ah Sahm on edge. It's his time, his life, he can do what he wants. If anyone tries to stop him—

"Look, we're all friends here, right?" says Hong.

Both Young Jun and Ah Sahm feel the same flicker of irritation, looking over at Hong. With his floppy hair half over one eye and a sunny smile on his face, rock-solid in his belief that he's being reasonable, he makes it difficult for them to glower at each other in full sullen resentfulness, and they do so want to glower. He's ruining the atmosphere.

"Fuck off," Young Jun growls.

Hong puts his hands up. "Sorry." He slides off the stool in an exaggerated motion, holds his hands up in a gesture of innocence. "Just saying, I think in about every fight we've had since I got here, we always end up being on the same side."

"That's business," Ah Sahm says, as Hong slips away.

"And what's this, pleasure?" says Young Jun.

"What does it matter to you?"

"I left San Francisco for this." And maybe Young Jun deserves to sound that affronted, because he demonstrably did indeed leave behind his nascent criminal empire to traipse after Ah Sahm like a loyal puppy.

Ah Sahm doesn't know if that makes things better or worse. "I didn't ask you to," he says gruffly.

"You didn't have to." As Young Jun motions to the bartender for a drink, Ah Sahm feels a terrible pulse of regret. It's not something that feels familiar; he's so accustomed to being the wronged party, and yet.

He pays for Young Jun's drink, hope that will speak for itself. "So are you going to drag me back by my hair?" he says, when the two of them have finished their drinks. Somehow, in the silence, more has drained away than just cheap whiskey. His shoulders are looser.

"No, I'm gonna save your ass," says Young Jun, and that's a surprise.

"Wasn't aware I needed saving."

"If you're seriously going to break into a building full of crazy, rich duck women..." Young Jun begins, and Ah Sahm doesn't even know why he's surprised. Of course. Hong again, tracking him. For all the sunny smiles and loud jokes in the world, that man sure knows how to walk in shadows.

Inconveniently, it is at this moment that Ah Sahm gets exactly what he wanted only ten minutes earlier. It's quite a few men, in fight terms; one yelling something about how they should speak English, or a variant—Ah Sahm wasn't really paying attention, doesn't have to, when the tone of the voice and the set of the jaw does most of the talking. Then there's the man's two friends, pretty committed, getting up out of their chairs. And then, he's pretty sure, there's a handful of men sitting at the table over who will jump in if given half an excuse.

Hong seems to materialize out of nowhere. "Carry on, you two," he says to them. He's rolling up his sleeves.

"Did I not tell you to fuck off earlier?" says Young Jun, exasperation on top of affection.

"You told me to get out, but it was cold outside, so I came back in."

The men are closing in, doing that semicircle thing they think will help them. To be fair, surrounding your enemy in a semicircle to trap them up against a bar _does_ help. It just doesn't help enough, if your enemy is Hong.

"It's California," says Young Jun. "It's not _that_ cold."

And then somebody throws a bottle and it all goes to shit. 

After the first ten seconds, Ah Sahm settles into it, like a dance, like a chess master seeing steps ahead, and suddenly there's that feeling of Young Jun at his side again, the way he knows which opponents he can ignore because Young Jun will take care of them, which opponents he can ignore because Hong's got them handled, the very obvious reach for a knife tucked in one man's waistband, the familiar crack of bone when he closes the distance and breaks that wrist. A punch one way is winding up for a backswung elbow, too. This is what he really wanted. This is what he always wanted. He could close his eyes and it would all unfold the same.

Afterwards, they leave the place, Hong grinning ear to ear, all hopped up on extra excitement like a kid given too much sugar, Young Jun smoldering dangerous with a little of his old cockiness shining through like light through a crack. As for Ah Sahm, he saunters. It's the thing to do.

They make themselves scarce after that, not wanting too intimate an understanding of the Sacramento justice system, and eventually they wind up outside an Italian restaurant, smoking in the moonlight. At some point, Ah Sahm blinks, and Hong has disappeared again. It's just him and Young Jun, and in the dark it's easier for him to say, "I should have told you."

"About the mayor's widow? Yeah," says Young Jun.

"About everything," Ah Sahm says.

"You should have." Young Jun exhales a long plume of smoke. "I'm pretty sure at this point, my dad would've had something deeply profound to say. But I can't fucking think of anything."

"Maybe just the word 'fuck' is enough," Ah Sahm says.

"The old man did love to swear." Before Ah Sahm can figure out whether or not he should acknowledge that this is the first time Young Jun has spoken of his father since his father left, Young Jun's broken the silence again. "You should have told me everything, but we're the same now. You know?" He looks up at Ah Sahm, and to Ah Sahm's shock and profound horror, he finds that Young Jun's eyes are shining, watery. "You can't let go of Mai Ling. I can't let go of you."

"Hey," says Ah Sahm. He drops the cigarette, steps on it, doesn't care about anything else any more. Doesn't know what to say.

"Leave a note next time, okay? That's all I'm asking. If I didn't already have Hong tailing you..."

Ah Sahm knows what to do with rage, and fear, and boredom, even grief. Guilt, not so much. He tries for reassurance. "I would have turned up fine a few days later, with a whole mountain of duck fuckery and extra trouble in tow."

"Yeah, maybe." Young Jun's staring out into the night. "Guess we'll never know."

It's a long silence then, and Ah Sahm doesn't even have a cigarette to take up space. There's something he has to say, but he isn't sure what it is.

"Recon tonight, jailbreak tomorrow night, then?" Young Jun says.

"Yeah."

"Hotel's this way." Young Jun chucks his cigarette butt into the gutter and starts walking. Ah Sahm follows, as he always does, and always will.

"I'm glad you came," he says, and feels it: _finally_.

"Ah." Young Jun's teeth are a flash in the dark. "Couldn't let you have all the fun, now, could I?"

"There's gonna be more than enough to go around," Ah Sahm agrees.

"Hey, that's your motto, isn't it? Ah Sahm: more than enough to go around."

"Fuck you." Ah Sahm's outright laughing now. "Like I haven't seen you try every brothel this side of the Pacific!"

"Hey, when you pay upfront, you don't have to pay afterwards. This—train to Sacramento, jailbreak, and then trying to find somewhere to stash a duck lady?—this is paying later."

They've arrived at the hotel. It's predictably shitty; Young Jun likes nice things, but he's also smart enough to want anonymity. He produces a room key for himself, then hands a key to Ah Sahm without a word, and that warms Ah Sahm: that Young Jun was so confident that he could find Ah Sahm again, that Young Jun was so confident they'd fall in together.

"Can we discuss my romantic failings later?" Ah Sahm says. "I need a nap before recon."

"You're such an old man," says Young Jun.

"Your elder _and_ better."

"Shut up."

" _You_ shut up."

"What a good night, hey?" says Hong happily, and seriously, how the hell did he manage to just appear? It's a simple, straight hallway, with no places to hide. Ah Sahm makes a mental note to check the possibility that Hong is some kind of martial arts ghost.

"Yeah," says Ah Sahm, looking at Young Jun. "Well, you two get some sleep. Try not to stay up all night fucking."

"Oh, that's a sore subject for him," says Hong.

"I'm a perfectly good-looking man!" says Young Jun. "I'm positively fucking handsome! I have knives!"

"I do like the knives," says Hong, "but you're not my type."

Grumbling and arguing still, the two of them crowd into Young Jun's room, and the door shuts behind them. Ah Sahm looks at it for a moment, finds himself smiling absurdly. Then he goes to rest. If he has his way, tonight's going to get even better.


End file.
